The Big Top tent was heaving with hardcore Squeeze Fans who clearly couldn’t wait to hear their favourite songs at Cheltenham Jazz Festival. Only knowing the hits myself, I was keen to see what the band had to offer.

Squeeze of course are a legendary band so it was always likely that they were going to put on a great show and of course, they certainly did!

Masters of their craft, the band individually played their instruments to a high skill. Glenn Tillbrook wowed the audience with his slide guitar skills at times and the band as a whole were exceptional and fascinating to watch. Tillbrook and Gifford came across incredibly humble which helped bring a very warm and inviting environment.

Squeeze were overall fun and simply brilliant live. Again, like many shows during the festival week, the audience didn’t get up and dance until quite far into the show but you could tell they wanted to. In fact, it wasn’t until after Tempted that everyone got up, but each and every standing member of the audience remained stood until the show ended. I blame our “being typically British again”.

It was actually quite emotional to see fans so happy to be there. For many, this show was probably their first time seeing them and they would likely have waited years for this moment.

For me, highlights were Tempted (Reality Bites film fan here), Cool for Cats and Up The Junction. As I said, I was only familiar with the hits but each and every song performed was a blast!

The energy was very high for the last few songs which made the show go too quickly!

The band took time to showcase their individual skills on their instruments which is always a highlight for me at any show! There is nothing quite like the sound of solo instrumentation. I believe this took place during Black Coffee in Bed.

I am not knowledgeable enough on the band to give the review that they deserve, however, from a new fan’s (who knew very little) perspective, I can say that they were a phenomenal act who more than delivered for their audience full of loyal fans. You would be hard pressed to find anyone who didn’t enjoy it!